Guild Wars 2

:) Thoughts?

One too many humans. One must die.

1. Kill off both humans
2. Replace them with Tybalt.
3. ???
4. Profit

mrauls.6519:

:) Thoughts?

Sort of. That has pretty much been the role of the ‘bi-conics’ in season 1. Part of that has to do with the voice actors of the real Destiny’s Edge having a rather tight schedule.

It’s also convinient in terms of story telling. The members of Destiny’s Edge are all big shots to their respective races and have now fought two Elder Dragons. The player character has a hard time competing with them. The biconics on the other hand are relatively minor characters who, apparently, see the player character as being their friend and leader. This makes the player feel like he’s more important.

One too many humans. One must die.

Destiny’s Edge had two asura.

1. Kill off both humans
2. Replace them with Tybalt.
3. ???
4. Profit

I don’t know how to break this to you, but.. that won’t happen.

Interesting Characters, but as long as they are not more pro-active aside from Majory, then please fade them out.

As long as they are not able to give us a “real” reason why they are involved in this stuff, aside from “we heard soemthing was going on here”, then please keep them away.
That is exactly everything they did in Season 1 (again, aside from majory who actually did something towards the end, however at that point several more qualified people should be able to extract more information out of everything…).

Give us a reason why we should follow them and not “more qualified” people, exept from “hey, they are our Biconics, people identify the LS with them and they like them.”

Less Fanservice, more (main-)story please

Diovid.9506:

mrauls.6519:

:) Thoughts?

Sort of. That has pretty much been the role of the ‘bi-conics’ in season 1. Part of that has to do with the voice actors of the real Destiny’s Edge having a rather tight schedule.

It’s also convinient in terms of story telling. The members of Destiny’s Edge are all big shots to their respective races and have now fought two Elder Dragons. The player character has a hard time competing with them. The biconics on the other hand are relatively minor characters who, apparently, see the player character as being their friend and leader. This makes the player feel like he’s more important.

Destiny’s Edge was not involved to keep personal and living story seperate, and thus prevent confusion over “Wait, Logan was just with me taking out some ministry guards/bandits… why is he over here fighting krait?!”

Jaken.6801:

Interesting Characters, but as long as they are not more pro-active aside from Majory, then please fade them out.

As long as they are not able to give us a “real” reason why they are involved in this stuff, aside from “we heard soemthing was going on here”, then please keep them away.
That is exactly everything they did in Season 1 (again, aside from majory who actually did something towards the end, however at that point several more qualified people should be able to extract more information out of everything…).

Give us a reason why we should follow them and not “more qualified” people, exept from “hey, they are our Biconics, people identify the LS with them and they like them.”

Less Fanservice, more (main-)story please

Sorry to break it to you, but that’s literally the reason the players are involved in the living story. “Hey, we heard there was trouble over here in this part of the shiverpeaks… how can we help?”

“Just heard about this weird tower appearing, what can we do?”

“Hey, we just heard LA was attacked! What can we do to help??”

Marjory is an investigator, member of the Priory, and a former minister guard. I’m not sure how we could find “more qualified people able to extract WAY more information from things.”

So if we remove Braham and Rox and such because “They respond to hearing about an event.” Let’s remove the players because that’s the EXACT same reason the players head for living story events in the lore. They get mail saying something is up, and follow it.

Kalavier.1097:

Sorry to break it to you, but that’s literally the reason the players are involved in the living story. “Hey, we heard there was trouble over here in this part of the shiverpeaks… how can we help?”

“Just heard about this weird tower appearing, what can we do?”

“Hey, we just heard LA was attacked! What can we do to help??”

Marjory is an investigator, member of the Priory, and a former minister guard. I’m not sure how we could find “more qualified people able to extract WAY more information from things.”

So if we remove Braham and Rox and such because “They respond to hearing about an event.” Let’s remove the players because that’s the EXACT same reason the players head for living story events in the lore. They get mail saying something is up, and follow it.

And that is good Storytelling?

As you have said, the only “qualified” character which has been shown to us was Majory, with her helper Kassmeer tagging along, with Rox and Braham stumbling itno them by chance.
All of them following Majory, who pieces everything (with some help of the player) together.
Rox and Braham are just everywhere through pure luck and are not even actively pursuing the supposed antagonist.
They should have their means. Norn wilderness instinct and Charr hunter…. they should have been able to track something. Instead they just apeared somwhere.

However, at that point several other parties should have been involved with that. Scarlet was a Person of Interest. Enemy number One for the humans, Norn and Charr at this point.
There should have been teams with dogs, magic sensors and who knows what out there.
Specialists to track down people…

Majory and in extension Kasmeer were the only one piecing things together and btw. much to late

Even if majory has the skills, everything she got in the end in her dedurction sequence was stuff that the Priory had in posession for a very long time.
You cannot tell me that in a group full of schollars was not able to piece anything together?

Sure, you can argue that Majory was only able to do so, since she has experienced some of the stuff with Scarlet herself.
However that is only about a third of the stuff that was there.

Taimi coming in too late in the story did not help either.

So yeah. There are several more qualified people who should have been able to piece things together in a world which encounters magic and technology on a daily basis.

This is a magical technological advanced world with gods, dragons and dozens of specialists who try to unravel stuff.
As soon as they reingeneered Scarlets teleport technique they should have been able to track her down. I mean, they are asura and there should be several working on that topic, right?

Focusing only on them and not actually acomplishing much, while there should be a lot of others out there, whcih could have been easily roped in (hey, weird technological monstrosities? that is exactly my expertise, i want to study that. Barriers? sure, i am an expert, i help…)

I get why they are exist and why we focus on them, do not get me wrong.
However as long as they make the world look stupid in compairson it is just not immersive.
I mean it took one expert asura to crack Scarlets teleport and then for half a year nothing?
Then the Scooby Gang comes around and finaly pieces things together thanks to Welma (Majory)?

Every encounter with Scarlets forces and the biconics was:
She did something —> Biconics react and call us —> we tward her plans

The only part where we took the fight to her did not involve the biconics.
It was Twilight Assault, which involved the Lions Guard and an Destiny`s Edge member.
So yeah, Ellen Kiel did more then the Biconics.

What would have been better?
Simple. Have them find and uncover something themselves. Which happens at one point with the ower of Nightmares, but again, that was Majory and in extension Kasmeer at that point.

However the others have a lot of potential that was not tapped in. All the time they were there, just because they had to be there, to become iconic.
Why was Rox at Teaquattle? Oh Rytlock send her there… and then the wholet hign was dismissed as a stupid sideplot as the two meet in LA.

Yes, the characters are interesting, but they were badly implemented into the story.

Actually, the player was the one who pieced most of the stuff together. It’s more of Marjory helped the player do it in the investigation scene at dead end.

Also, they figured out how to get into scarlets portal to the pavilion. They didn’t break into her entire portal network. ALSO likely she CHANGED the portals afterwards.

Rox and Braham wandering around was mostly BEFORE Scarlet actually appeared. And after she appeared, they worked to go after her.

I don’t think they were badly implemented honestly, also I didn’t say Marjory was the only skilled or qualified member of the biconics. I simply said she WAS skilled, so shoving her aside and suddenly having a random priory member would be more jarring.

Bashing them because of things that affected the player characters just as much makes no sense. Why was the player at tequatl? Why was the player at the marionette? Tower of Nightmares? because they heard about it and went to investigate.

So the player is even more usefull then the supposed “greatest detective”, does not really help the case.
However i let it slide, since the player at this point needed some encouragement that he was actually doing something, so it was a good thing. I do not argue that.

Portals
I do not think so. To get into the pavillion, the player had to run around playing errand boy and collect samples from different portals of Scarlets army, sugesting that it is indeed a shared network they are using.
To get into the pavillion, which was shielded through magitech was only possible by using the enemies own network.
So even if she is changing the network code, what stopps the asura, as well as other experts on the matter do it again and again.
More so, since Scarlet was still using the technology sending troops all over Tyria.
I do not think she was soooo smart to outwit several experts at once.

Rox and Braham
- After their introduction they said they wanted to find out who was behind everything.
- We see them again at the queens pavillion where they are because rythlok sends Rox there. Rox has a reason, braham just tagging along. After that they have a “new lead”.
- Tequattle, Rox is there just because Rythlok said so
- Tower of Nightmare: “We heard something was going on” and it is still not clarified if their apearence in the tower were halucinations or if they were for real (since only Kamseer and Majory were with us till the end in this story).
This is the first time the two group met.
- After that point they are following Majorys lead, there was even a dialog somewhere, in which they told them to call them, if they have a new lead on Scarlet.

While i have to agree, them wandering around before her apearence and after is debatable, since it was unclear if there actually was a mastermind at that point, but in the end, even if they were present, they were there through luck or running after something and in the end giving the hunt mostly to Majory.

Diovid.9506:

Destiny’s Edge had two asura.

And one died!

Jaken.6801:

Interesting Characters, but as long as they are not more pro-active aside from Majory, then please fade them out.

As long as they are not able to give us a “real” reason why they are involved in this stuff, aside from “we heard soemthing was going on here”, then please keep them away.
That is exactly everything they did in Season 1 (again, aside from majory who actually did something towards the end, however at that point several more qualified people should be able to extract more information out of everything…).

Give us a reason why we should follow them and not “more qualified” people, exept from “hey, they are our Biconics, people identify the LS with them and they like them.”

Less Fanservice, more (main-)story please

The biconics were involved because of Scarlet. Braham’s homestead was attacked, Rox was given orders – they met up in the MA threat which Scarlet was behind. Marjory and Kasmeer, co-workers, were hired to solve an assassination Scarlet. Since then, they were tracking Scarlet down, and ended up meeting up together during Tower of Nightmares. Scarlet was also why Taimi came in – she’s a fan of Scarlet’s work.

In Season 2, we’re already told what they’re going to be doing: investigating the dragon’s roar (Marjory+Kasmeer) and the voice in Scarlet’s head (Braham+Rox). And we have Belinda whom will likely act as a bridge, being that she’s Seraph assigned to Brisban Wildlands.

They always had a reason to be involved. It’s always been more than “I heard there’s something going on here” – it was “we got attacked by Scarlet and I want revenge/to stop her” and now it’s “we’re going to stop the threat behind Scarlet, and whatever her actions spurred.”

As said above, “I heard something was going on” is why the players are involved. We heard, or were asked for help, and we showed up. The biconics had legit reasons for showing up.

Jaken.6801:

So the player is even more usefull then the supposed “greatest detective”, does not really help the case.

I didn’t know Sherlock and Batman were in GW2! :O

In seriousness, whomever said Marjory was the greatest detective? She’s just a detective. A good one, but never called “the greatest.”

well, since i’m already logged in, i’ll chime in.

i see absolutely no problem with “we heard something was going on here, so here we are” as a driving motivation for what’s essentially a group of adventurers by now. it’s a fantasy world, “adventurers for hire” is what has always driven the genre in games, and having some of the NPCs follow a similar rationale as the player actually makes them easier to sympathize with, in my opinion.

that said, everyone, player included, has more reasons to do things than just “i’m an adventurer for hire, general problem solver and explorer”. but since konig already pointed those out, i feel like i don’t have to bother explaining them again.

Okay, i know they are legitimations why they there. They wanted revenge. Which is something what i stated before.

The thing is, they are not the only ones who lost someone to Scarlet and swore revenge.
There should have been a lot of others, some of them even more suited to the task.

Like a group of the queens personal guard.
An asura or priory research team
A group from the pact.
etc..

Again, i like the characters on their own, but not their implementation and the fact that it so strict focused around them instead of someone else. Someone who actually should do the stuff because they are best suited.

None of them, aside from Majory, is “special” enough to be more importand then any other revenge/couriosity driven person in Tyria.
(while you can argue that Kasmeer is a powerful Mesmer, Braham is Eirs son and Rox is close to Rytlock, if it is there but not used, why bother?)

Even if we reduce the number of people who are actually capable to do something (not hindered by fear, capabilities etc. ) there should be enough “specialised” people out there to actually get stuff done. (like the asura that hacked the portals of Scarlet and only apeaered at the end again to spout some exposition.)

While i understand the idea of “these are just adventurers and no special people”, just someone who was at the wrong time at the wrong place. None of them really did something against Scarlet, aside from Majory and again, even her biggest involvement and solution came at the very end (Nightmare Tower poison cleaning and deduction of Scarlet).
At a point where it was too late and all the stuff was allready at the priory and appearently no one else was able to figure out and put two and two together…

The fact that these characters are great but in the end do not really contribute something to the solution, aside from being there for the player to interact with (again, exept Majory sadly) and tell us about their life.

They do not stumble about something that turns the tide at any point, making them worthwhile to the overall mystery, exept in their introduction.

Does anyone find or does something special that is not something that someone else could have picked up/have done?

All the evidence (at the end) was based upon fragments escavated after Scarlets seperate plots were stopped. (drillparts, parts of marionettes, old holos, etc. nothing the group picked up but other people)

Even at the end they just pop up in Scarlets drill, god knows why and are just with you there for the final fight. While at the great hologram fight Ellen Kiel and the Heal-o-Tron help you.

I do not hate the characters. I am just talking about what i think would make a better story and the simple fact that this world is filled with magic and technology on a daily basis and the enemy was using these things and targets everyone makes it very hard to believe that this group is supposed to be the responsibles for bringing her down, while she evades everyone else?

I do not include S2 here since it has not started and they can implement them better then, but for S1 i am annoyed that these are the “heroes” while the rest of Tyria did not really seem to care about Scarlet at all (but hey, we got to see Logan and Rytlockfor a cameo.)

Hey, it seems like in S2 they are actually taking us on an adventure, their own hunt/investigation.

btw. the “greatest detective” thing that came into my mind. It has no real meaning and was just to emphasise the things. In the end our character started an idea and she finished it so it is 50/50… also we need a sherlock hat in the gem-store asap

just because you’re seeing a slice of what’s happening, doesn’t mean that slice is everything that happens. example: rox didn’t stop tequatl. she brings up the equivalent of a “small army” showed up to kill him, and she was also there. example 2: the lion’s arch aftermath has a mural with “hundreds of names of the heroes and defenders of the city”. obviously, you look for your own name there, instead of listing every single player and NPC that was in there. and so on and so forth.

the player and his NPC friends are just a slice of the bigger picture. it’s the side you see, because it’s the side you’re involved in. it would make little sense for a whispers charr to be messing around with priory people, or a seraph task force on a special mission, or whatever have you. it would be like a research team in the real world having influence over every research team in the world, just because they’re researching similar things.

Jaken.6801:

Okay, i know they are legitimations why they there. They wanted revenge. Which is something what i stated before.

The thing is, they are not the only ones who lost someone to Scarlet and swore revenge.
There should have been a lot of others, some of them even more suited to the task.

Like a group of the queens personal guard.
An asura or priory research team
A group from the pact.
etc..

Here’s the problem with your idea there.

“Specializied” or “REALLY SUITED” groups would likely already HAVE a task.

Shining blade/queens bodyguards would have the task of GUARDING THE QUEEN. Not roaming all over the world.

Asura of Priory team would have their own tasks, and I’d likely say those tasks if related to scarlet would be inside a single instance. Like the one researching the krait shards (which all disappeared after their guards fled with them into portals). You can mention having one (if you do) to the priory norn, but otherwise their job is mostly done. Also, we hear of Priory teams that were researching Scarlet or working on her stuff.

Group from the pact, I’ll take this as “The Pact” leadership headed and NOT just meaning the orders (which gasp, we know had teams working on it from various dialogues)… why would they? If they aren’t in Orr/Frostgorge/shatterer fight (though I think the latter is purely Vigil and not the Pact), they’d likely be on leave and vacation. The Pact forces we know about are heavily involved in anti-dragon actions. A group from Frostgorge or Orr isn’t going to leave just to chase down scarlet.

You see, a group of ‘random’ adventurers works best because they DON’T have anything tying them down. We don’t have to come up with some reason why Rox and Braham show up at the tower of nightmare, they are adventurers, they wander and ADVENTURE. They can (for the most part) go where and when they want.

lockheedlight.5910:

1. Kill off both humans
2. Replace them with Tybalt.
3. ???
4. Profit

So Risen Tybalt then? Hey guess that would be interesting, if somewhat awkward when he starts chewing on someone’s leg.

Diovid.9506:

RoseofGilead.8907:

One too many humans. One must die.

Destiny’s Edge had two asura.

1. Kill off both humans
2. Replace them with Tybalt.
3. ???
4. Profit

I don’t know how to break this to you, but.. that won’t happen.

Or… zombie cat who likes apples.

Kalavier.1097:

Here’s the problem with your idea there.

“Specializied” or “REALLY SUITED” groups would likely already HAVE a task.

Shining blade/queens bodyguards would have the task of GUARDING THE QUEEN. Not roaming all over the world.

Asura of Priory team would have their own tasks, and I’d likely say those tasks if related to scarlet would be inside a single instance. Like the one researching the krait shards (which all disappeared after their guards fled with them into portals). You can mention having one (if you do) to the priory norn, but otherwise their job is mostly done. Also, we hear of Priory teams that were researching Scarlet or working on her stuff.

Group from the pact, I’ll take this as “The Pact” leadership headed and NOT just meaning the orders (which gasp, we know had teams working on it from various dialogues)… why would they? If they aren’t in Orr/Frostgorge/shatterer fight (though I think the latter is purely Vigil and not the Pact), they’d likely be on leave and vacation. The Pact forces we know about are heavily involved in anti-dragon actions. A group from Frostgorge or Orr isn’t going to leave just to chase down scarlet.

You see, a group of ‘random’ adventurers works best because they DON’T have anything tying them down. We don’t have to come up with some reason why Rox and Braham show up at the tower of nightmare, they are adventurers, they wander and ADVENTURE. They can (for the most part) go where and when they want.

And that is the point.
Scarlet is supposed to be a thread to at least 3 races, which she attacked directly, but we barely see or heard of someone else doing something.

Logan and the Seraphs were cut back,
Rytlock send only Rox directly (sure, he “investigated” in the background somwhere, but the reasoning was never made clear. He could really just be interested in the random probes at that point)
And the priory apearently had most of the tech and studying it for over half a year and got nothing, while it took Majory and the player a bit of brainstorming?

Sure, we can boil it down to plot convinience, Majory being smart and that we only had enough data after the Tower of Nightmare and Majory able to study her computer, but this is still a lot of time.

Even if we consider that we see only a fragment of what is really going on.
Say that “suited” groups are tied down with other tasks (tahts why i said etc. before)

There should be an official group from every involved party, which near the end was basicly everyone, considering who Scarlet involved, how much destruction there was etc.

I only say, that cutting down the whole reaction of the world to “yeah scarlet is bad, but why should we react?” (whcih is exactly what happened. We are told she is bad, but we see barely any reaction. Again, we see Logan who swore to avenge the attack of the Queen only once after the Crown Pavillion. We see no Seraphs of him helping us the entire time. That is sad, evenif we consider Anise holding him back.)

The fact that we “only” experience most of the story through this random group of adventures, with only one member who actually does something proactive is just a sad statement.

Again, i am talking about how the story we got thanks to these characters reflects the world.
Most of them are justified to be there, but so are several others as well.
Beside majory none does really does something to drive the plot, aside from their own character developement, further.

I do not hate these characters. I like them for the most part. However they are representive for what was wrong with the delivery of the S1.

Again, it might be just my opinion here, but even if we consider that our time and the story time do not really align (which should, given that the festivals are part of the story) and accept the “excuse” of political sluggyness, then all reactions to Scarlets “worldwide” terror, were pretty light overall.

I ask you. Wouldn`t you use a lot more ressources if a terrorist breaks down every security you have and attack your queen?
Attacks your people in your own land
Attacks your politics in the open and places a big base of high tech operations right under your nose?
Poisons your land?
Does mass murder with a giant marionette?

As long as the world feels so “dumb” it makes me really hard to take these guys serious as “the ones who took down Scarlet”, since i would always ask: “what about the rest of Tyria?”

With the weapon test Taimi appeared and I searched for answers about her. I travelled through several places that could be connected to her including Zojja. Zojja wasn’t at home, but she is today (and I think usually she is home too). She wasn’t involved in LS1. I cannot remember any place (especially around/after Marionette) where she was involved. I leave this here, because there are untold stories that are happening.

The overall lacking reaction especially from famous NPC (like Jennah whose fresh opened pavillion was attacked) was disappointing.

The new group is interesting, but not more like the old one because there are informational gaps everywhere or why do the Zephyrite talk about Eir being the new Glint and what does it mean at all?

Braham has mentioned that they’re forming a guild. Tiami will force her way in. The player character perhaps even leads the guild which might be news for many players, particularly those that skipped LS1.

My guess is that this guild will have someone from each class although they might not all be there all the time.

Add Canach to the group.

I wonder what those two sticks of bamboo are for in the screen shot…

The Zephyrite ships are made of bamboo amongst other things; that’s likely part of wreckage from the explosion we see.

probably, its just the way it looks, since they are standing on a ledge, makes it seems like some sort of bridge…your most likely right though